cpd2009 Wrote:Hmm... perhaps I spoke too soon on the Seagate disk. Somehow a few of my backup files got corrupt. I'm now running SeaTools diagnostics on the drive through VirtualBox.

That's quite a drag, and you know how expensive it is to have them recovered and all.

As for copyright law, it only goes to show how rigid this current system is, and that them ivory tower types are still shooting themselves in the foot for still sticking to that outdated business model.

cpd2009 Wrote:Hmm... perhaps I spoke too soon on the Seagate disk. Somehow a few of my backup files got corrupt. I'm now running SeaTools diagnostics on the drive through VirtualBox.

That's quite a drag, and you know how expensive it is to have them recovered and all.

SeaTools took about five hours to complete the long form drive reading, but it stated there were no errors. I'm thinking of running it again under Lilly's Windows 8 install to be completely sure. The previous test was run under a VM.

As for data loss, it wasn't much hopefully. In fact, my backups are so disorganized that I probably have them somewhere else, and if something is truly lost, it's something that can be recreated easily. (think Screencaps or MP3 files).

Why are you letting the VM access the hard disk directly? You shouldn't do that- letting two OSes access the hard disk raw at the same time is a recipe for disaster. The VM should only have access to the disk image it's confined in and share files with the host over a reliable and safe method, ie network or VM-proprietary protocol. Giving both OSes access to the hard disk = bad.

RAMChYLD Wrote:Why are you letting the VM access the hard disk directly? You shouldn't do that- letting two OSes access the hard disk raw at the same time is a recipe for disaster. The VM should only have access to the disk image it's confined in and share files with the host over a reliable and safe method, ie network or VM-proprietary protocol. Giving both OSes access to the hard disk = bad.

The only thing I saw, possibly, was decreased performance as I had the external SeaGate run through the VM via a USB 2.0 filter. I know that with CD/DVD drives, VirtualBox won't allow the host OS to use it if it's redirected to the guest. If OSX has mounted the drive, VIrtualBox unmounts it before sending it to the guest. OSX can't access the drive again until VirtualBox releases it.

I assume the same happens with external devices you add to the filter like external HDDs and flash drives. If Oracle knew that adding external HDDs to the USB filter could possibly be dangerous, then why was that ability included in the VM settings?

I need more information though.... how can having a VM and host OS accessing an external USB HDD be a recipe for disaster? The disk was for backup and was already corrupt before I did my diagnostic. I didn't feel like rebooting into Windows 8 and the VM seemed to work fine, though the test speed was very slow.

I do have the Vista VM configured to use a shared folder with OSX, but this is used only for dropping finished DVD rips to said folder, which from there I can transfer to a flash drive and deliver to Audrey. I have to run my DVD transcoding programs under a VM now since installing them on the same system as Adobe Premiere (Windows 8) will cause AVI files in Premiere to lose sound. The program uses either Divx or Xvid codecs and installing either one has the same effect.

Well, either way, I still won't trust a VM with a direct connection to the hard drive. Typically I use drag and drop if available, otherwise shared folders or even network shares will have to do. This comes down to VMs having inconsistent timing, I'm a bit paranoid that a timing skew would be enough to mess up the hard drive.

To be honest, the last time I let a VM write to a USB stick, said stick is now a piece of paperweight- for some reason, it got write-locked and everything I've tried to do to unlock it is in vain. The stick is stuck in read-only mode. And I can't low-level format it because the stick's partition table is changed to GPT with Linux partitions and none of the stick repair programs could detect it anymore (yeah, I was messing with a bootable Linux stick).

RAMChYLD Wrote:Well, either way, I still won't trust a VM with a direct connection to the hard drive. Typically I use drag and drop if available, otherwise shared folders or even network shares will have to do. This comes down to VMs having inconsistent timing, I'm a bit paranoid that a timing skew would be enough to mess up the hard drive.

To be honest, the last time I let a VM write to a USB stick, said stick is now a piece of paperweight- for some reason, it got write-locked and everything I've tried to do to unlock it is in vain. The stick is stuck in read-only mode. And I can't low-level format it because the stick's partition table is changed to GPT with Linux partitions and none of the stick repair programs could detect it anymore (yeah, I was messing with a bootable Linux stick).

Hmm... now that you mention that...

I did use my old Kingston 4GB stick with the VM, but it came out fine like the USB HDD. I think I won't plug in external HDDs to a VM anymore even if it does work slowly. I don't want to make my 160gb HDD unusable or perhaps even more corrupt than it is presently.

At least having VirtualBox shared folder option works. I can copy the finished AVI rips there and after the VM is shut down, use Finder to copy the files to the USB flash disk or whatever is on hand.